ACADEMY OF SAINT GABRIEL REPORT 3114 http://www.s-gabriel.org/3114 ************************************ 22 Jun 2006 From: Aryanhwy merch Catmael Greetings from the Academy of Saint Gabriel! You wanted to know if is an appropriate name for a woman living in 14th-century Norway. Here is a brief letter with the information we have found. is a form of . While is found in Sweden as early as the 14th century [1], the earliest we found it in Norway is in the 16th century. We found the following forms of during your period: [2] Katerin, 1329 (vol. 2, nos. 168, 170); 1352 (vol. 2, no. 313); 1385 (vol. 1, no. 493); 1389 (vol 8, no. 216); 1395 (vol. 3, no. 523) katrine lafwrenza dotter, 1371 (vol. 21, no. 137) ffrw Katrine hanss husfrwue, 1315 (vol. 4, no. 112) Katrin, Katrinn 1306 (vol. 2, no. 82) Your choice of byname is fine. We found two men, 1338 (vol. 1, no. 252) and 1360 (vol. 1, no. 368), which demonstrate the spelling and the genitive (possessive) spelling in the 14th century. (Here the {th} represents the Norwegian letter thorn, which looks like a superimposed over a

.) We also found 405 examples of the spelling during the 14th century. [2] Based on this, is the most likely form of the name for the 14th century; , , and are also possible. The given names are all pronounced roughly \KAH-t(@)rin\, where the \(@)\ is the sound of in or , and is very lightly pronounced. was pronounced roughly \POHLS DOAT-tehr\; \OH\ is the vowel in , but drawn out a little, while \OA\, the vowel in , and \eh\ are shorter in duration. We hope that this letter has been useful to you and that you won't hesitate to write us again if any part was unclear or if you have further questions. Research and commentary on this letter was provided by Talan Gwynek and Juliana de Luna. For the Academy, -Aryanhwy merch Catmael 22 June 2006 -- References: [1] Friedemann, Sara L. "Swedish Feminine Given Names" (WWW: Self-published, 2001-2003, 2005) http://www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/names/smp/ [2] Diplomatarium Norvegicum (http://www.dokpro.uio.no/dipl_norv/diplom_field_eng.html) The Diplomatarium Norvegicum is a searchable index of medieval Norwegian documents. Searching for results in 21 hits, the earliest of which is 1511 (vol. 2, no. 1040).